


Druxy

by darkavenger



Category: Dark Avengers (Comic), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: M/M, Mental Health Issues, Misogyny, Natural Disasters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-12
Updated: 2016-06-12
Packaged: 2018-07-14 16:38:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7180586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkavenger/pseuds/darkavenger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Something which looks good on the outside, but is actually rotten inside.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Druxy

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a writing meme and originally posted on Tumblr.

Bullseye’s out of his head. He’s been out of his head for days. Keeps tucking his pills under his tongue and spitting them into the toilet when no one’s around. He’ll take the paranoia and delusions over the drug fog that clouds his mind when he does take them. They dull his killing edge, and he can’t stand that. Needs to stay sharp stay brilliant stay Bullseye.

He twitches on the couch, a bubble of manic laughter rising like gas. He swallows it, aware of Karla watching him, in her own corner of the lounge. He looks back, leers. She watches him like she’s watching the monkeys at the enclosure, like she’s just waiting for him to start slinging his own shit.

Oh, she’s a cold bitch, Karla is. It’s what he likes best about her, besides the tits of course. She’s probably writing him up as a particularly interesting case study right now. Not that her professional opinion carries much weight these days.

Mac pops his head round the door, retracting it hastily when he sees Bullseye inside. God, what a fucking waste. Alien symbiote at the disposal of that pathetic excuse for a villain. If it wasn’t for the symbiote, he’d have killed Mac by now, and he loses himself for a few pleasant moments in contemplation of his teammate’s murder.

When he opens his eyes, Daken’s sat on couch beside him. Bullseye jerks away in alarm, a snarl on his lips and a hand reaching out for something to throw. Without looking at him, Daken reaches out and grabs his wrist, squeezing gently. “Shh,” he murmurs absently, dragging his thumb soothingly over Bullseye’s knuckles, eyes on the tv set like he gives a damn what’s on, like he’s doing this for any reason other than to get under Bullseye’s skin.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” Bullseye hisses, spit flecking as he yanks his hand free.

Daken shrugs and lets him go easily, as if disinterested in Bullseye’s reaction.

Bullseye curls his hand protectively against his chest, out of Daken’s reach, then catches himself. Another flash of anger. Daken’s knocked him off balance and he wasn’t steady to start.

Bullseye turns away.

The television is talking to him.

The newscaster is telling him about major flooding. News footage plays, showing him scenes of massive destruction, houses destroyed, video clips of crying children. The newscaster reads him the death toll, then looks at Bullseye and smiles. Bullseye smiles back.

“What a mess.”

Daken interrupts Bullseye’s private communication with the newscaster, reaching over to grab the remote off the coffee table and change the channel. The news is playing on that channel too, showing the same footage. Daken makes a vexed noise, looking disgruntled. “Why do they insist on playing those clips over and over?”

That makes Bullseye laugh, the laughter rattling in his chest. “Don’t tell me it bothers you. A few lousy civilians dead.”

“Of course not,” Daken reprimands him, “I just don’t see why they waste so much time reporting on deaths caused by a natural disaster. Look at them,” his dark eyes flick to the screen, where the footage still plays, tragedy caught in an endless loop, losing impact with each replay, “they talk and talk, about preventative measures that could have been taken, about how the government should have reacted quicker, reacted better. As if it would have saved them. As if it would matter.”

“Just be glad Osborn doesn’t have us out there playing hero,” Moonstone murmurs, curled up in her armchair.

Bullseye had almost forgotten she was there.

Daken’s lips thin in a sneer. “Oh, I’m sure he’d love to get footage of us hauling squalling children out of wreckage.”

“It does make for good publicity,” Moonstone says with a yawn, stretching. 

As if on cue, the news cuts to the break, and their advert comes on. Normy smiles insincerely, Iron Patriot helmet tucked under an arm as he deliver a rousing message to his fellow Americans. Behind him, like a heroic backdrop stand his Avengers.

“Ugh,” Karla says, sounding almost as disgusted as Bullseye feels. “The camera really does add ten pounds. Not to mention that horrendous get-up Norman has me in.”

A vein in Bullseye forehead pulses unpleasantly as he looks at his own horrendous get-up. The fun of playing dress-up has long worn-off, and the superstitious fear he’s losing himself is rising.

“Speak for yourself,” Daken says, darkly amused. “I think I have the face for television.”

“We’re wearing masks,” Karla scoffs.

Daken shrugs, a smile playing on his lips as he watches himself. “Still.”

Bullseye curls a lip sourly. The mongrel isn’t wrong. The media eat his shit up. Osborn is understandably wary about any of them talking to reporters without a handler, but the paparazzi are hard even for HAMMER to handle. Out of costume, Bullseye has to keep out of the public eye - that’s one scandal even Victoria couldn’t spin - but photos of Daken regularly surface. Apparently he’s a fan favourite.

It makes Bullseye sick, it really does. The way the mutt goes around flaunting himself, and the way the public react to it, fawning over his image in the gossip magazines. They don’t see him. They don’t see past the pretty, polished surface. They don’t see that he’s like Bullseye - a killer, and rotten to the core. Even the people who should know better don’t see. There’s more than one HAMMER flunky Bullseye’s caught pawing at Daken in some corner somewhere. He thinks Daken does it on purpose, in places he knows Bullseye will catch him. Like he knows the odd mixture of attraction/repulsion Bullseye feels, the way his skin crawls at Daken’s touch, but the way he craves that touch too, more than any drug, like he craves the blood, the kill.

Daken reminds Bullseye of a plant he’d seen once, in some rich man’s garden. He’s not much of a botanist, but this plant left an impression. Amorphophallus titanum. The corpse flower. A hothouse plant, that flourished in feverish heat. Sickly plant, venomously coloured, the flower was acid green, bruise purple, orange like the dying sun. It was rare, hard to cultivate, the pride of the rich man’s collection. He’d told Bullseye proudly how it only bloomed every seven to ten years, and then wilted within a single day. Seven to ten years spent waiting for the fucking thing to flower, and then when it did it stank of rotting flesh.

That was Daken, all right. A fucking corpse flower. It doesn’t matter how he tries to cover it up, Bullseye can still smell his stink.

Compulsively Bullseye bits at a nail, worrying at the bits of flesh at the side. Beside him, Daken shifts absently, leg brushing Bullseye’s thigh. He flinches back, and hates himself for it. It’s not real, he tells himself. Still, his eyes flick sideways to Daken’s face, cadaver pale in the flickering light of the television, and he shudders, sure he can see maggots pulsing beneath the smooth skin.

If I cut you open, what would I find…

His fingers twitch with the urge. Not today, Bullseye tells himself. Not today.


End file.
